My goal everyday is not to have a good day; because instead to have a funny day. I gave up on good days a long time ago, but really you have no control over that. Terrible things could be lurking around every corner. You might decide to look at your kid's grades online and become irritated they did not finish the math problem like they swore they did. You might find yourself picking up 707 Pokemon cards in your son's room in preparation for the cleaners and then having an internal struggle over why you are such a privileged complainer. You might stub your toe. A tooth could break (big fear over here!).
But, you can control your perspective, of course, and for me, the only perspective I enjoy is the one in which I can laugh at something about everything that happens, even if it is something truly terrible like the things that have happened in my own life. I think God's gift to me was an ability to laugh in horrible times--honestly, it's the only way I've ever gotten through anything.
I still laugh once in a while about the Chaplain who tried to have a prayer circle over my comatose brother. His nurse, Jen (who would later be the DJ in the operating room where my brother would die) said: "I don't think his sister is into prayer circles."
It was so funny because I had just finished telling Jen that I find prayer circles to be things for cults and women in floor length dresses made from fabrics in pastels from the discount rack at Joanne Fabric and I could not abide any of that in my time of spiritual need and that I felt the devil always brought some prayer circle lover into my midst in these dark times to irritate me.
Fifteen minutes later, that chaplain walked into the room. And within seconds, God said, let's laugh. And so, I did.
Everyday, there is something ridiculous to laugh about. Like, today, my high schooler, who is not supposed to be able to use her phone at school has texted me at least 17 times about a math test. She is clearly texting while hiding the phone in her school bag because the messages make very little sense and she keeps texting the words "Jim Butterfingers" and I have no idea what this means. Then she gets angry when I cannot figure it out.
Part of me hopes she is caught and forced to tell her teachers she was texting her mother about Jim Butterfingers. Or I have to defend her and invent a backstory about Jim Butterfingers, in order to save her from detention. (However, she probably deserves detention! All my darling, brilliant children need detention! Preferably with the ability to take the late bus home. . .thanks!).
But, alas, no one caught her texting about Jim Butterfingers; so I made her go to Target and get me some Butterfingers. . .because they are absolutely my favorite.
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